drinking
/ˈdɹɪŋk.ɪŋ/
"drinking" is a 8-letter English headword indexed on PlainSpell.
The verdict
“drinking” is a regularly-used English word, ranked #1,993 in English word frequency and used as a noun.
- #1,993
- frequency rank, English
- 8
- letters
- 13
- tracked misspellings
- 6
- confusable pairs
According to Wiktionary data (CC BY-SA, analyzed May 6, 2026) - An act or session by which drink is consumed, especially alcoholic beverages.
Visual similarity to commonly confused words
How many letter changes separate each confused pair (Levenshtein distance, normalized).
Source: PlainSpell confusable corpus (Wiktionary, CC BY-SA).
| Property | Value |
|---|---|
| Headword | drinking |
| Language | English |
| Part of speech | Noun |
| IPA | /ˈdɹɪŋk.ɪŋ/ |
| Letters | 8 |
| Frequency rank | #1,993 |
| Misspellings tracked | 13 |
| Confusable pairs | 6 |
| Source | Wiktionary (kaikki.org) |
Where “drinking” sits in English frequency
Spelling & Dictionary Insight
The English entry for drinking is 8 letters long, classified as a noun, and transcribed in the International Phonetic Alphabet as /ˈdɹɪŋk.ɪŋ/. Corpus data places it at rank #1,993 in overall English word frequency, indicating it appears regularly in written and spoken text. The dominant gloss from Wiktionary reads: "An act or session by which drink is consumed, especially alcoholic beverages.".
Our generated misspelling index lists 13 likely wrong-spelling variants for drinking, with forms such as "ddrinking", "dirnking", and "drikning". Every one of these variants traces to a single-character edit -- an added or dropped letter, a swapped consonant, or a vowel swap -- the kind of slip a spell-checker is built to catch. It also participates in 6 confusable-pair relationships, "driving", "dripping", "dining", and more, a pairing that trips writers up because the two words share enough sound or shape to blur together.
Etymologically, the entry records: Inherited from Middle English [Term?]. By surface analysis, drink + -ing. The correct English form is drinking, spelled D-R-I-N-K-I-N-G.
Definition
- 1An act or session by which drink is consumed, especially alcoholic beverages.
Etymology
Inherited from Middle English [Term?]. By surface analysis, drink + -ing.
This word in other languages
Common misspellings
Also misspelled as: ddrinking,dirnking,drikning,drinikng,drinkign,drinkingg,drinkinng,drinkking,drinknig,drinnking,drniking,drrinking,rdinking
Misspelling Pattern Breakdown
How far each generated variant is from the correct spelling of drinking - measured in single-character edits (insert, delete, or substitute a letter). Larger bars are easier to catch; one-edit slips are the sneakiest.
Definitions, pronunciation, and etymology for this entry are drawn from Wiktionary via the kaikki.org structured extract (CC BY-SA); frequency ordering uses the FrequencyWords open word-frequency list (2018 English corpus, MIT). See the methodology for how each field is sourced and updated.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you spell "drinking"?
What does "drinking" mean?
What words are commonly confused with "drinking"?
How do you pronounce "drinking"?
What is the origin of the word "drinking"?
Is PlainSpell free to use?
Using “drinking”
The practical upshot for anyone who landed here from a spell-check.
- The one correct English spelling is D-R-I-N-K-I-N-G - every other letter order is a misspelling in standard orthography.
- Say it as /ˈdɹɪŋk.ɪŋ/ (IPA); tap the speaker on the pronunciation badge to hear it where audio exists.
- Don't mix it up with “driving” - see the side-by-side comparison. drinking vs driving
- Browse more English words and confusable pairs in the same reference. English words
Data Source
Wiktionary (via kaikki.org), licensed under CC BY-SA & GFDL. Word ordering uses an open word-frequency list; misspelling variants are generated by edit-distance from the correct headword.